Welcome to another episode of ADHD-ish, where we explore the lived realities, hidden challenges, and unique gifts of being neurodivergent in business and life.

Today’s episode is an intimate conversation between friends, colleagues, and fellow neurodivergent entrepreneurs.

Returning guest, Dr. Naketa Ren Thigpen, is an expert at the intersection of relationships and entrepreneurship, who has made the decision to forgo a formal diagnosis, while fully accepting her ADHD traits.

Together, we explore how trauma, workarounds, and unapologetic authenticity shape both personal growth and professional impact.

3 Key Takeaways:

• Workplace Dynamics Are Deeply Human: So many organizational challenges stem from unresolved personal issues that show up at work. As Naketa says, bringing relational intelligence into organizations is the next frontier for trust, performance, and true inclusion.
• Diagnosis Isn’t Required for Legitimacy: You don’t need a formal diagnosis to embrace your neurodivergent identity. For some, building effective "workarounds" is enough to thrive—labels can be empowering for some and unnecessary for others, as powerfully shared.
• Hyperfocus Is a Super Tool—With Boundaries: Our ability to “hear the words and the music”—to focus deeply and be truly present—is a neurodivergent gift. Guarding these focus states with strong boundaries is key to making the most of them, both in business and personal growth.

About today’s guest, Dr Naketa Ren Thigpen

Dr. Naketa Ren Thigpen is the Architect of Intimacy in Innovation, the world's foremost Balance (and) Relationship Advisor, and Co-Founder and CEO of ThigPro Balance (and) Relationship Management Institute.

Embodying her wild & rare nature, she moved beyond traditional therapy into something the industry hadn't seen. Double Board Certified and doctorate-trained in Relationship Dynamics, Dr. Naketa licenses Applied Relational Intelligence Systems to mid-market organizations, certifying their own leaders to reduce turnover, stabilize trust, and accelerate decisions from the inside.

Her private advisory, BAR COTERIE, serves a select few bold enough to recalibrate success without regret. Named among 100 Women to Watch in 2026 and honored by the NAACP, she proves one thing: intimacy fuels innovation.

Connect with Dr Naketa:

• Website: https://thigpro.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/naketathigpen/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/asknaketa
• Naketa’s framework: Applied Relational Intelligence System (ARIS)
• Substack: https://thigproquo.substack.com/

Your ADHD-ish™ host, Diann Wingert

Diann Wingert is a former therapist turned coach, speaker, and consultant who blends her expertise in entrepreneurship and neurodiversity to help others thrive.

Host of the top-rated ADHD-ish™ podcast and creator of The ADHD-ish™ Method, Diann works with ADHD-ish™ business owners who are ready to create stand-out, sought-after, profitable businesses based on their unique brilliance.

What’s the first step for turning the business you have into the business you want? Take the ADHD-ish™ Business Blindspot quiz

Loved this episode? Leave a review and tell us why!

© 2026 ADHD-ish™ Podcast. Intro music by Ishan Dincer / Melody Loops / Outro music by Vladimir / Bobi Music / All rights reserved.

G: So I've had a lot of arriving and evolving evolutions just like you have and we've kind of expanded. The through line for me is still to strengthen relationships, but now in this new season of being a grandparent, a parent advisor of young adult children now that are out here making babies and whatnot, I honestly wanted to do something that was more scalable but also had deeper intimacy and impact. And what that looks like for me in this season is codifying a lot of those methods and frameworks that I've done for this year.

Our business is 16 years old, so the first 2/3 of the time in our business when we're creating all the programs and all the things that we've done for individual clients, group clients, organizations, and now we're systematizing them and I call it Applied Relational Intelligence Systems. Because now I'm helping these mid market organizations, we're literally certifying their own leaders to help them reduce their turnover, stabilize trust, strengthen trust and accelerate decisions from the inside. And that I think is one of the most powerful legacy oriented gifts that I can give before the other half of my life ends, hopefully 50 plus years from now.

H: Oh my gosh. There are two reactions I have to this, one is we've talked about this previously. You and I both know with our therapy backgrounds and just our life experience backgrounds that everybody's got issues from their family of origin, some of the most common relational issues, trust issues, attachment issues, people have sibling rivalry issues that are not resolved. They have issues with authority figures that they bring into the workplace and I literally thought about this so many times.

Somebody needs to bring all the like, emotional and relational intelligence from couples therapy, family therapy into the workplace and make it practical and tactical because the number of people who, they don't necessarily hate their job, they hate the workplace dynamics, the politics, the power struggles, the personality conflicts. And it's like, we gotta do better or everyone's gonna have to be an entrepreneur.

G: Yeah. And not everyone is built for that.

H: No, ma'am.

G: And that is the reality, yeah bedroom from the boardroom, kind of, for lack of a better analogy, that the second half of our business years, which, you know, we were amplifying intimacy from the bedroom to the boardroom with those entrepreneurial couples and things. It's still very much alive and true, but now we have to package it in a way that's HR friendly right. Because, you know, some of the deeper part of that bedroom conversation, which is very relevant to how we transform our creativity, how we transmute it, to be specific in that, but they can't handle it and that's just the reality.

Organizations are not able to handle the fact that you can take your sexual stimulation and all the things that are coming up with your libido and your drive and literally transmute that into creative problem solving. They're not built for that which is why I will always keep a private advisory. So for those that are willing and ready, we can go deeper into that where it's appropriate. So the larger 80%, if you will, of what we're doing is creating those psychological safety skills that are helping people within those organizations build and maintain those high trust relationships. To your point earlier, I think it was off air before we started recording, when we have these people leaving organizations, the quiet quitting, the plain old quitting, all of that is usually not because they're disenfranchised with the work.

It's because of the folk, they are tired of these supervisors, managers, leaders, CEOs and everything in between, including their colleagues coming with all of their familial issues and their problems and their untreated traumas and challenges and vomiting on them and calling it a meeting and. Or saying, we need to do something and have mediation, because you're not hearing me, when it's really their abandonment issues that are coming up. And all I said was, no, I don't want to work with you, Paul, on that task. Or in that project because I'm aware that you won't be accountable but we're not having those conversations. We're just projecting it onto others in these workplaces and a lot of my work now is addressing that.

H: I think it's undeniable that the workplace has changed dramatically, not just since the pandemic, although that's been an evolution with AI and just the workplace is ever changing. But human beings still expect to be able to show up in that workplace the way they always have with their beliefs, biases and blind spots. With their relational deficits, and not expect to have problems, which it really is totally illogical when you think about it. And generally speaking, it's always someone else's fault, you know, I'm not creating the problem, she's creating the problem. And I think it's sad, but true, especially for people that are neurodivergent. Finding the workplace in general and workplaces in specific workplaces inhospitable to their needs. Need for safety, need for autonomy, need for trust, need for respect. These things shouldn't be such a big ask and yet it feels like they are.

G: They are, I think some of it anchors to an achievement distortion. There's the thing that I did to earn my role in this organization. I'm just going to pick something random. I'm the CFO of this company. And as the CFO of this company, I went to school for X, I achieved Y certificate. So now I expect Z level of respect and adoration of me. And although granted, people should be respected and have the appropriate authority within their role to get things done, you know, ultimately to get shit done so that has a percentage that has a place in the whole big scheme of it.

However, if you're doing all of this because you feel that it gives you some kind of power over people where it's not just about like, hey, you know, there has to be things that are done. Use the term earlier, linearly, you know, in order to get this project done in three weeks, we have to do abcd, let's not skip a step. That's okay for the CFO to put that out, but if you think that somehow you have the power to break people down in their spirit or make them feel bad about not doing A the way you want it to, when ultimately they still got B, C, D, E, F and G done, they just did it in a different order, but it still all got done. You have to look at where you're coming from with your achievement.

Are you so distorted that you think fear is the way to get people to do things to make them feel like they're going to lose their job or they won't be promoted or any of those, you know, rewards and recognitions that we want when we're inside of an organization? Or are you also people pleasing to your father who died 20 years ago, who told you would never be able to do something. And now you're going extra hard and extra aggressive because you're trying to prove someone who may or may not still physically be on this plane that you're worthy instead of addressing it.

Go sit on someone's couch that is appropriately trained and licensed and all of the things, and get some support instead of coming to work and vomiting your fear and your fake power play and all the different things on these people that if you saw them in the street, you probably wouldn't address them that way. And I think everyone needs to be mindful that we're human. You're a human, I'm a human. Don't think that because we're in the walls of this Zoom or this cubby or this glass building that I may not react as a human if you keep trying to dehumanize me at the end of the day.

H: You know, I'm constantly reminded by the fact that neurodivergent folks, folks like you and me, have justice sensitivity as a dominant attribute, but we also have an uncanny knack of seeing things that other people just don't see. I don't like the term superpower, but it is a super ability. I thought for many years growing up, am I literally the only one that can see the emperor has no fucking clothes here? Things that were so obvious to me, you know, but then I realized you don't see that, you don't feel that, you're not noticing that. Do you think that your own neurodivergence gives you an unfair advantage in doing this kind of work because I think it does.

G: Yeah and honestly, I don't know if I would call it unfair and maybe that's me being selfish, right? Like, you know, being selfish in that way but I think we all have gifts, some are more polished than others. Some of us have embraced the gift and you and I have talked about this offline. There's some things, even with your evolution into ADHD-ish, you were already qualified for 20, 30 plus years before you came out to the world and started to, you know, started to kind of super niche down and that's not something you need to apologize for or to put in a big claim.

But the reality is it was already a gift you had. You just weren't willing to share it publicly as the more polished version of one of your many gifts and talents and I definitely did the same thing. And I do it constantly with one of my abilities because I won't use gifts the way that you mentioned it. One of my abilities is synergizing information. You could talk for 20 minutes straight and I'm tracking the whole time.

I don't get lost, even though my ADHD sometimes wants to pull me into squirrel mode and, you know, go sparkles over there. But I have a wonderful ability to be able to pull the through line. And I can reframe everything you said to you in a way that is more digestible to you than even you thought it would be. And now you feel heard and you are seen and you feel validated and it's not a party trick. It's something that I'm anchored to because my highest ability, if you will, the one that is supporting my synergy ability, is edification. It's something that I have been blessed with.

It's something that I embraced really early on in my young childhood, having to parent parents and doing all the things that in our earlier conversation, we were talking about the problems and dramas and traumas as well as the gifts and blessings that you got from your family. Some of those things showed up as part of my survival skill, and I embraced it and held onto it. So I don't know if it's unfair versus, you know, I was just willing to pay attention to what it was that came up for me and use it.

H: It's not a popular conversation, and it's one that's very easy to misunderstand. You and I have talked about this over the years, and it's not true for everyone, but something you've experienced. Something I've experienced and I always say nobody becomes a psychotherapist for no reason. Most of us have a serious trauma history.

G: Fact.

H: But there are and gifts is truly not the right word. There are attributes that we acquire by necessity. Yes, there was trauma. Yes, there's the effects of trauma. Yes, we both, you know, both been purveyors of and beneficiaries of lots of therapy to deal with all that. But you learn to be an astute observer of human behavior because the conditions required it. And I think your neurodivergence adds a layer to that intersects with it, enhances it, if you will. But being able to listen to the words and also the music, what people are saying and what they're not saying, and being able to bring that all together and articulate it back to them in a way that even they are like, how did you do that?

Yeah, I mean, it makes you a super therapist. But going into the workplace, I think what a mission field and what a minefield because they're more defended there. They are less likely to say, yeah, I think I do that. So really, I mean, you need to be someone who's very skilled and very experienced to do that safely and to do it well. So it makes complete sense that that is the next evolution and iteration of your business and it's so needed. It's so needed.

G: No, I appreciate it. I really am connected to the kinetic visual that you gave with being able to hear the words and the music, because a lot of people don't often, you know, some of us and I'm guilty of it. A beat drop and I'm moving, I did not realize they were just cussing out their mama in those words right. Because the beat connected to me and I'm shaking and, you know, moving and grooving. But when you are zoned in to your example and you can hear both, it changes what you go along with. It changes how you advocate. It changes what you decide to separate yourself from or to join in. And I think that also makes you really amazing as a business coach to be able to pull yourself away from the noise of the bro marketing and all the things, and also from a lot of the women entrepreneurs and founders that are out there.

Some may have been clients at one point. Some may probably need you like yesterday to understand that they don't have to lose and you and I were talking about this earlier too. Their intuition, their inner brilliance, the thing that helps guide them because someone is telling them that they have to do business a certain way. It also not respecting that they think so beautifully and so differently because they're neurodivergent. And I think that's exactly why you are needed, specifically you for your skill set, your expertise, your education. That wasn't a 39.99 certification in coaching over an hour or a weekend, okay, let me be really clear about that. But also, you have acumen and experience and a shit ton of case studies to say like this works.

H: Darling, I'm properly humbled. We have a lot of commonalities, a lot of areas that we've uncovered over the years of this friendship. We are both former therapists, we're both neurodivergent, we have childhood trauma, so many things. But one area where we diverge is that not too many years ago in my grand old grown ass age, I got officially diagnosed with ADHD and have been treated for it.

Now, I suspected many years ago all three of my adult kids have ADHD, only one of them diagnosed in childhood when I did my master's thesis on the topic of whether ADHD is a lifelong condition. Because in the early 90s when I was in grad school, all the pundits said nope. And we weren't even talking about girls and women yet. But I got diagnosed and treated and you have embraced your neurodivergence. You talk about it openly. You got many branches of your family tree bearing all kinds of neurodivergent fruit.

G: Facts.

H: You choose not to be diagnosed. And actually you, among others, are part of the group of people that I was thinking about when I rebranded and embraced ADHD-ish. Because not everybody needs to be diagnosed, not everybody wants to be diagnosed, not everybody can be diagnosed. There are legitimate reasons to be diagnosed and quite a few reasons not to be. I'd love to hear you talk about for you, why that's just something that's part of your identity but a diagnostic label not necessary.

G: Yeah, I mean, I'll be fully transparent and honest. So there's a little bit of ego and of course, you know, the doctor should never treat him or herself. The therapist should never therapatize him or herself right and I made an exception for myself. I can open up a DSM 5 and say, okay, you have all but one of these symptoms if you're being clear, honest, hyper focused, all the things and I've masked really, really well. So that was part of the rebuttal of it for so many years. Like, oh, I don't fit the criteria for this because I wasn't looking at how I was masking my alarms have alarms, Diann.

Like, I'm so serious about my organization and all the things and I just thought it was just the way, you know, we just put things this is just the way it is. I put it in a just the way it is box. Not realizing that a lot of it was because I was having some executive function issues. And I being a lazy and innovative overachiever myself, my 21 page CV says you don't have problems, achieving. You don't have problems with your executive function, right? Like if you want to look at, go through the ego of it, like all these certifications, degrees, all that girl, you all right, right like you're fine. But the reality is how I was able to do it is I had to embrace. Which is why I say lazy. It's just my little tongue in cheek of embracing rest and not feeling guilty about it. I really do need my naps. I really do need time to wiggle my toes. I really do need time to walk away and process some of the things before I go ham and go really hard.

But I didn't realize that was a way of me masking and burning out sometimes when I wasn't masking well. And I had to really step back and look at that and say, okay, well you clearly meet the criteria when you, you know, pull the mask off and look at what you're doing in order to, you know, strive and be efficient in the many different ways. And then the other way the lazy shows up for me is what good would it do for me personally for me Nikita Ren Thigpen what good will it do for me to get diagnosed? Does it change anything for you? Do you believe it more now? Do you believe it less? Do you need medication? You know, that might be a reason, you know what medication, be supportive. And because I have a rare autoimmune and some other things going on, I'm always super mindful of that too in that element.

So I really, you know, being fully transparent, there was a little ego in it. Like you already know the boxes is checked you don't need nobody to tell you. I'm doing just fine but then there was also the where do you have time in your schedule to go and get a 90 minute plus evaluation to make yourself confer, to confirm for yourself what you already know to be true. That isn't going to change what you're doing and how you're doing it. Because if I have some serious restrictions that are coming up that are impacting my business, well, I know Diann Wingert. So I can like, you know, we need to do 12 sessions to get me right, right. Like, you know, or whatever it is if I need some support in my personal life, therapists and mentors and advisors and that the table, the chairs are full of who, of who I need.

So I really had to sit with myself of why would you need to do this? Is it really to prove a point and who are you proving a point to? Now if I thought I had a personality disorder or a serious mood disorder, that would be different, I would, absolutely. But I don't see neurodivergence as a wrong that needs to be labeled unless I need additional support for something like two of my three grandbabies, which, you know, have autism. One is level two, one is level three, so they need higher levels of support. You absolutely need that diagnosis to get the support you need in and out of the classroom.

H: It’s an access issue. I mean, there's no access without a diagnosis. You can't say, well, I think or I feel that that's not going to open your door.

G: Absolutely. But as a nearing 50 year old woman, I don't necessarily know that it would give me anything else to get a formal diagnosis. And that doesn't mean that if something comes up for me, then I'll say, oh, well, I'm too much in my ego to do it. Well, of course, you know, I'm a homeopath, I treat myself with herbs and oils. But if my leg needs a surgery, I'm gonna go to the daggone doctor and get the allopathic medicine so I know when to do it. I just don't feel like it's necessary at this particular juncture of my life or my business.

H: You've said so much in that and I wanna unpack one part of it, especially for the listeners who identify with this. They're like, yeah, I'm pretty sure this is me. Most adult women, especially over 40, they've always known they had these traits and they've had a variety of what I call attributional theories. Oh, it's because of this, oh, it's because I'm creative, oh, it's I'm this, I'm that, or whatever, or I grew up without structure or too much structure.

We just, we go down the list. Oh, it's because of this but what you call masking, and I don't doubt that there's been masking because frankly, masking creates safety. Especially as a woman of color, there has been a need to mask, to create safety in certain spaces right. Even as a white woman, there has been a need as a woman to mask, to create safety. But what you were referring to in calling it masking to me sounded more like what I considered ADHD workarounds. Like you're terrified of being late because time blindness has entered the room.

G: Yes, it has.

H: You don't want to disrespect people. You're a professional. You want to be a person of integrity. You want people to be able to trust you and depend on you and count on you. So you show up early. Now, I haven't learned that party trick, but to me, that is not masking, but an ADHD workaround. You know, you have this tendency to lose track of time, but you do not like the consequences of track of set time. So you put in the notifications and the alarms and the showing up early as a workaround so that you don't have to experience the unacceptable, uncomfortable, inconvenient, annoying consequences of your adhd. So I don't have a need to be right. Listen, girl, it's workarounds, not masking because there's not business, not my ego but I want you to give yourself credit.

G: Yeah.

H: For the fact that all the times that you realized over your lifetime and the incredible success that you have achieved, your education, your long term happy marriage, your wonderful relationship with your children and grandchildren, and all the incredible good work that you've done with clients and others.

G: Thank you.

H: You've created workarounds for every one of those pesky ADHD traits that would limit you from fully showing up and being who you are. But the other thing I think is important, and not everybody understands this, especially folks that are self identified is, well, I took the checklist and I'm pretty sure I have ADHD, so I could get a diagnosis, right? Not necessarily because we are both well acquainted with the DSM5 and all the versions that came before, you could have every damn symptom trait on the checklist, as you just said but if you do not also have impairment.

G: Exactly.

H: Nor functioning as a result of said traits, you're not diagnosable and I think because of your workarounds, my friend, you might not qualify for a diagnosis even if you check all them boxes so there's that too.

G: That's a really good point. So I first want to say I received the reframe of workaround. I think that is a better fit than the framing of masking, because masking does have layers to it and I have created a boatload of workarounds for so many different things. To this day, my nearly 30 and 25 year old children, young adult children, are irritated with me whenever we have to go anywhere to any family function because we're always there on time, which is early for me. And everyone else is an hour late and they're just like, we're just sitting here now we're forced to help decorate or to.

Because of course, if you get somewhere early, you have to participate in getting things ready right. But it is a thing for me, so it's okay so I receive the workaround, I receive that framing, thank you for that. I will say that I definitely have the impairment or had the impairment in work and relationships and business. If I removed the workaround, it would not be pretty. I would not be as focused in the generous way that I need to versus the hyper focus. You and I were talking about this when we were doing a walk a little while ago and that plus perimenopause. It's a combination of things but I can be very irritable if you pull me out of my hyper focused state.

H: Yes, ma’am.

G: And it can definitely make my normally loving, cherishing, doting husband stand back from me for a minute like, who is this woman? Because you do not look or sound like yourself because I interrupted you. So like yeah, it definitely has come up in a lot of different ways.

H: No, it’s true and I think I just experienced this last night. We live in a neighborhood that's active 55 plus and we have a lot of neighbors that have become friends and they're out walking. They're out walking their dogs, they pass by our house. They're kind of either looking in the window or if we're sitting in the back or whatever, or if the door's open and one of our dogs runs out, they're greeting the dog and we usually come out and greet. Well, this happened last night and I was right in the middle of hyper focusing on something that I needed to get done. I wanted to get done and I wanted it to get done then I did not want to get up and go chat with my neighbors just because they happened to come by. And I was afraid they could see me because I had my laptop on the dining room table and the, you know, the shutters were open and I could see if one of them steps just a foot to the left.

She's sitting there so I literally unplugged my computer, got up and crept into the next room and closed the door because I could talk, I'm going to see them tonight. And I'm like, no, bitch, I need to finish my hyper focus session because I get irritable AF if you interrupt me. And I know it's not reasonable, but I'll tell you what, and I'm sure you would defend this in the same way. What I'm able to get done in one of those hyper focus sessions like, why would you interrupt that? Like, I'll get so much more done and it'll be so much faster and so much better like, leave me, leave me be, you can't recapture it so easily. Once you break the spell, you might never find your way back to that magic.

G: It's really really difficult to find that. I think the term that a lot of people are using is flow like, you know, to find the flow, to get in the flow and you know, I resonate with that to a degree. But when I so I truly believe and Diann, you know me well enough to know that I'm very spiritual, very grounded in that way. I receive downloads all the time, and those downloads confirm so many things for me, maybe even things that I didn't, you know, think I was ready to admit or to face or to realize and much of that is being poured through my work.

So you're interrupting, potentially, if you're interrupting a hyper focus state, you're interrupting healing, you're interrupting strategy, you're interrupting action and planning, but also sometimes dreaming, that price is way too high for anyone's ass to have to cash. If I get upset in that because you pulled me out of so many layers of deep intimacy with me in whichever way it's being funneled out. And it might not even be a work project, I might be putting together a big old gift for one of the grandbabies, right like, it could be something that I'm just really focused on. It's not always necessarily work, but it's important to me. And because I'm someone who shows up very visibly present with other people, you'll never see me with my phone out.

It's always a way on the other side in my purse when we're at a restaurant, unless, you know, someone's in the hospital and we're waiting for something urgent outside of those kind of extenuating circumstances, I am fully present for you when you need me. So I need you to back up when I am fully present with myself in whatever work that I'm doing. And I know that that is a hard line boundary for a lot of people. But I'm not willing to override my own boundary to make you feel better about wanting to wave at me and have a five minute conversation when I'm going to see you later tonight or whenever it is that I'm going to see you.

But respect it so that when we're together, we can be in our intimacy dance and I can be fully available for you in that 2 minutes, 20 minutes, 2 hours, whatever it is, because otherwise it's just not going to be good for either one of us. And you're probably going to look at me differently, like, who is this woman because you were so pleasant before, like, yes. But right now I'm in surgery, I need you to respect it back up and get out of the you know, I know your husband's a physician, so, like, get out of the secure space and walk away, because you cannot taint this and I just, I mean, what I mean.

H: I mean, you are probably the best example of someone I know well who has healed her trauma, developed her essence, spread her gifts, all while knowing you were different and not knowing the actual description of that difference for most of your life. And the way you express yourself, the things you talk about, the perspective that you take, your willingness to speak uncomfortable truths, your willingness to call things out that might make other people feel some kind of way, it's such a powerful and potent example of this is neurodivergence in action. This is how it helps to and the spirituality, I think those are two equally profound influences.

But your ability to trust yourself, your ability to say the things that need to be said, your ability to be present, it's one of the first things I learned about you years ago is like, when you're talking to somebody, you are all in it. You are not distracted, you are not preoccupied. You are fully present and it's something you can feel from the other side of a zoom screen. And that is, I mean, some people are so hungry for that. People are so hungry to just have someone pay exclusive attention to them. And I'm gonna guess, yeah, that you taught yourself that, what conditions you needed to be able to do that because you're naturally distractible.

So you just eliminated anything that would distract you because the power of your presence is so profound. I think very few people are able to do that, very few people who are neurodivergent are able to do that. And I think you have achieved, like a really high level of mastery over that. And it feels like to be a person who experiences that from you, spending time with you, you literally feel like you are the only human that matters in that moment. So that's an awesome and that's a form of hyper focus too, right? You're just hyper focused on the person, the conversation and fully present.

G: Yeah, no, I receive all of that. The energy, the truth, the love that just poured through you and that I receive it in the core of who I am. I'm so grateful for you seeing me in that way, truly seeing me. It is something that I had to learn to do, both as a survival, safety skill, but also as a way to make it really clear to me what was important in the moment. And when I have the privilege, and I see it as a privilege to sit with a friend, to sit with a person, a potential client, a client, whatever the case is, with my 11 month old grandbaby. When I have the privilege of having that moment. Part of why I see it as a privilege is because I've lived a very real life and I don't take it for granted.

There is breath in my body, I could not be here. I've lost a lot of people that died years ago and I'm not just talking about family. People who were my age that died from heart attacks or strange things or cancers or whatever and they didn't have an opportunity to sit with their good friend that they can't wait to go and meet in person for the first time ever right? And to have these moments, to start a business, to maintain a business, to grow a business, to scale a business, they didn't have these opportunities. And I'm not doing it in a, I don't know what the frame is. You probably have you're a wordsmith, so I know you have the word for it, but I'm just going to say a trophy.

You know, the trophy way of like do it for the other people, it's not about that, but it is a reminder of the absolute gratitude that I have that I won't hide behind. I won't hide behind the gratitude and play small and say, oh, I've done so many wonderful things that that's enough because I want more. Like there is an and I honor it and I cherish it, but I also don't want to look so much at the what's on the other side of whatever it is I'm dreaming up and wanting that I miss this moment with my friend Diann, that I miss this second right now.

And so I deepen into that because intimacy really is a leading force for me. It's a driving force because it helps me make the multi generational imprint that I am on this earth to do and I know that that's my purpose. The how is edification, the what is the imprint I'm here to break the curses and all the things, and many of that I have done, those generational patterns and all of that much of it. But there are so many more things that I know that I have to break for myself that I didn't even know existed yet, because I haven't reached age 80 yet, I haven't reached 90, like I haven't reached those other versions of myself yet. So I'm also willing to learn and I can't do that if I think I'm always the smartest one in the room.

I need to be here and present and learn from whoever it is that I'm talking to, even if it is an 11 month old child like, oh, she smiles so much. I didn't smile enough today you know, whatever it is, like I'm looking for what I call the 0.01% when I'm in that moment. So call it being intentionally selfish to be so present, but it really is so I can be a better version of me and I can give you the best version of me in that moment. And hopefully we'll just get better the next hour, the next day, the next month, and so on and so forth.

H: Preach, preach, preach, preach. I have to ask you this question, do you think it was inevitable that you would start your own business? I mean, you had a I wouldn't say it's a conventional path to become a psychotherapist because less than 10% of people in this country have a master's degree. But do you think it was inevitable for you, knowing the kind of person you are? We've talked about this like we are both on this path that I call the path of continuous personal evolution.

It also is professional evolution. We don't say, okay, that's enough, I've expanded enough, I've created enough. I've done enough. I am enough. I've never feel like I need to be more or do more from a place of scarcity or inadequacy. It's like I'm driven for growth, I'm driven to grow and I'm driven to share that growth with others as you are. Do you think it was inevitable that you would be self employed?

G: I do. And of course I didn't see it right as a child. I definitely had a lot of street entrepreneurs in my family, if you will right, the non converted term that way. But I definitely the non conventional, non taxable version. So I didn't necessarily equate that to business startup, foundational, any of that. What I did learn really early, which probably if I had thought about it early enough is unfortunately a lot of the women in my family always had multiple jobs, always a minimum of three jobs on any given day, minimum, regardless of relationships and children or not. And I definitely picked up that kind of altar at 12 years old, was working to not just get candy, but to help pay bills and to do all the things.

And in my early 20s, married with kids and all of it in school because, you know, we've been in school forever. I had a minimum of three to five jobs at any given time. And I did look at that when I was kind of contemplating becoming a formal, legitimate legal entrepreneur not the street version. When I looked at that, I said, well, how do I put this down and pick this up? And I had no idea that becoming an entrepreneur was more like 12 jobs. Especially when you're self funded, especially when you're starting from zero. You know, no mentoring, no advisor all of the things that so many people listening to this can agree to.

And you know, sometimes trying to save scraps for later because you're not sure what's coming tomorrow and then getting out of that mood too. So I think I was built for it because my life, my trauma, my drama, all of it definitely geared me to have the foundational muscle to be a good entrepreneur. But I had no pathway, no blueprint to become one. So I didn't see it from like that logistical perspective, but it was inevitable because I am built differently and I recognize that and my difference is beautiful as much as it can be brutal in so many ways.

H: I would agree that it was inevitable for you for all the reasons. And one more I would add is this, I've come to call it everything's figureoutable mindset. Some of us acquire it by necessity because we had to survive our childhoods and figure things the fuck out because there was no grownups that could be trusted to help us or lead us or protect us. But I think the neurodivergent mind, it's curiosity, well, let's just try this and see what happens. This need to just do things and to do many things. And who but a person with ADHD traits is going to even attempt to run a business where they have to wear multiple hats or even start it to begin with, with no more than a thought sometimes well, how hard can it be, I'll figure it out, girl. It's gonna be hard. You will figure it out, but it's gonna be hard and you're also gonna figure a lot of things out about yourself.

G: Yeah.

H: In the process. I don't know who to credit this quote to, but I'm sure you've heard it as well, Nikita, that becoming an entrepreneur is the ultimate personal growth process because it really introduces you to your strengths, your struggles. And if you are self funded, you literally have to figure things out and you either stop or you start to think, you know what? I think I can be good at this and I think I can make this more fun. And I wonder what's going to happen if I do it this way. And the next thing you know your business is not only profitable and sustainable, but it continues to evolve in new ways. Like, I didn't even know when we recently reconnected that you had completely changed what you were doing and who you were doing. I didn't even know about the applied relational intelligence system. But like you've said to me so many times, I'm not surprised. I didn't know, but I'm not surprised it's like, right, yeah, that figures.

G: Yeah, that's so true, because I think for both of us, we're not afraid to arrive at the moment and respect wherever we are, but it doesn't limit us from evolving, and it definitely won't stop us from expanding, whatever that looks like tomorrow or the next day. And the through line is always still built on the strength that you have or the ability, the attributes, as you said. And as long as you're anchored to who you are, you're golden, it doesn't matter. I might start a business where I'm selling T shirts with statements on them that feel really good. Like, you know, it'll still be awesome because it'll be built on everything that I know that I am, you know?

H: And everything that you've learned along the way.

G: Absolutely.

H: Where would you like people to find you on the Internet if they want to know more about Nikita Ren Thigpen after listening to this conversation.

G: One of my new favorite places to play is Substack. So I don't know if, you know, the listeners are already over there. Of course, they can find me on LinkedIn and Instagram and all the things. But Substack is where I'm having some deeper conversations, more intimate conversations. And writing has always been something that I've kind of done so privately, so secretly and I'm a very private, public person. Ask me the right question and I'll answer it transparently but I'm not offering it. And on Substack, I'm offering more of my thoughts, my stream of thoughts. It's not just a bunch of here's some tips and tools and things.

It's like, what is happening in the mind of this human who's worked with so many other minds of other humans. So Substack is where you can find me more intimately and get to know me. It's ThigPro, it's a little play off of Think Pro, which is the name of the shorthand name of my business for ThigPro Balance and Relationship Management Institute. It's a mouthful, but if you just look up Dr. Nikita Thigpen, Nikita Ren Thigpen. I use my middle name more now that I've embraced my full self in the last seven years, my middle name, but it's there. So Dr. Nikita Ren Thigpen, then you'll see all the things.

H: Well, I know what I'm gonna do. Right after we hang up, I'm gonna sign up for your Substack. Thank you, friend.

G: Thank you.